


meet me in a dirty bar (with half a glass of whisky in your hand)

by orphan_account



Category: Captain America (2011)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-16
Updated: 2011-08-16
Packaged: 2017-10-22 16:25:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/240057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He thinks about pushing him away or maybe punching him in the face and making a quick escape out the front door but, in the end, it's been awhile and if Howard wants to play this game then Bucky figures he might as well play along.</p>
            </blockquote>





	meet me in a dirty bar (with half a glass of whisky in your hand)

**Author's Note:**

> written for [this prompt](http://capkink.livejournal.com/810.html?thread=224042#t259114). I DON'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON!!!!!1!!11!!!! no, really. I do. I just. wow. okay. WORDS. WORDS. WORDS. I haven't written a fic like this in a very, very long time and I apologize if any of it seems weird or awkward. I got to a certain point in the fic where I just wanted to write "AND THEN HE PUT HIS MOUTH ON HIS MOUTH AND ALSO OTHER STUFF" and try to see if I could get away with it. so, yeah. hopefully this isn't a complete disaster and I'm sorry that Howard Stark talks like he might be working a British accent I'm not entirely sure why that happened.

It's like this: There is Before the New Steve and there After the New Steve.

Before the New Steve, Bucky and Howard knew what the soft skin of a beautiful woman felt like and they knew it almost every night if they were lucky.

After the New Steve, the only way they felt a woman's touch other than accidentally was if they shaved their own asses and felt themselves up.

Yeah, it was _that bad_.

Apparently, Steve was at the top of the "get into my bed and let me ride you until the morning" chain and Bucky and Howard were stumbling towards "oh you're Steve's friend? That's nice" level on the chart. It was painful and frustrating and worth getting drunk over so the two of them found themselves both in the same place at least five times a week but not exactly in the same area. Bucky had this way of taking up the entire bar by just sitting there and Howard was that kind of guy who could sit in a booth by himself and look like five people.

But, one night, Bucky is sprawled over the stool he always sits at, nursing his third glass of whatever-the-fuck the bartender keeps giving him when Howard ( _the_ Howard Stark) is walking over and leaning against the bar and not quite sitting down and he's putting his almost finished drink on the counter and tilting his head and smiling. Smiling at _Bucky_. Bucky doesn't put his glass down but he lowers it a few inches from his mouth and just kind of side-eyes Howard for a few seconds before shrugging and facing forward again and acting like if he just keeps staring at the wall in front of him, maybe Howard will go do something else to _someone_ else.

"You're James Barnes, right?" Howard asks like he already knows and Bucky just shrugs again and maybe laughs a little.

"Sure."

"Right." He sits down, uninvited, and scoots a bit closer. Bucky looks down, watches Howard's legs wrap around the legs of his stool as he drags it across the dirty floor and then looks back up into Howard's dark eyes and frowns. "Another drink?"

"Sure," Bucky hears himself say again and he has to practically hold his own shoulders down to keep them from meeting his ears for a third time in less than five minutes.

"Is that all you can say?"

"Nope," Bucky says as he chugs down the rest of his drink, slamming the glass against the counter. Suddenly, there's a hand on his arm. It's warm and he narrows his eyes and then glances at it. Howard is smiling devilishly and oh, okay. So that's how it's going to be is it? Bucky's heard things about particular people who get handsy when they've had a bit too much and the guy sitting next to him is always the first name to come up. He thinks about pushing him away or maybe punching him in the face and making a quick escape out the front door but, in the end, it's been awhile and if Howard wants to play this game then Bucky figures he might as well play along. He grins back and raises his eyebrows just a bit. He's got a new drink in front of him and so does Howard and for a little while nobody is saying anything or touching each other while they both take those first few sips. "How long have you been here," Bucky asks and Howard pauses.

"You'll have to be a bit more specific than that."

" _Here_." Bucky puts more emphasis on the word like that was enough because the alcohol is finally starting to go to his head and he's gone past the ease of eloquence and fallen hard into simple sentences.

"A few months."

"You're in too good of a mood to have been here for a few months."

"Well. That's because I'm not out there shooting people. Being a man of science has it's perks."

"What if I liked killing people?" Because Bucky knew soldiers who did, who liked it quite a lot (maybe too much) and they'd consider a life behind a desk, surrounded by electronics and _not_ killing people lacking in any kind of perks whatsoever.

"Do you?" Howard asks and he sounds startled, like any guy who's that close with Steve couldn't possibly enjoy putting bullets in people's heads.

"No."

"Good."

"Good?"

"I'd have to leave if you had said 'yes'."

"Well then, yes. I greatly enjoy shooting people's brains out," Bucky says and Howard laughs and, even though he tries his hardest not to, Bucky laughs too. "You're still here."

"I've got nowhere else to be."

"I find that hard to believe." From what he hears, Howard Stark _always_ has somewhere to be, even when he's sleeping, and Bucky refuses to believe that tonight is an exception.

"Fine," Howard admits, "I've got a million places to be but I'm afraid I'm far too drunk to make myself leave."

"Ah. I see. And here I thought it was my good looks and charm that was making you stay." Howard doesn't reply (unless his shit-eating grin counted) and downs the rest of his drink, moving just a bit closer and Bucky doesn't bother to push back because, yeah, it's been awhile and Howard is warm and Bucky's throat and mouth are suddenly dry and maybe it's been a lot longer than he thought.

It's all Steve's fault.

"What's all Steve's fault," Howard asks and Bucky shuts his eyes for a second or two because he forgot he tends to let out what's supposed to be inside when his head is punching and swimming with alcohol, "The fact that the two of us are sitting here, talking to one another instead of whispering sweet-nothings stolen from the outside of greeting cards into the ears of gorgeous women?"

"Nail meet head," Bucky says, signaling for the disgruntled bartender to fill his glass again. It's another quiet few minutes and Bucky can't help but wonder what Howard would be doing to try and get him under the covers if he was a woman because right now he's doing a pretty piss poor job (not, of course, that Bucky _wanted_ that (much) but it was just the principle of the thing). He's even keeping his hands to himself and Bucky thinks about touching him just to see what happens.

He's not used to purposefully reaching out in situations like this (usually, normally, his hands just kind of did their own thing which, sure, got him into trouble sometimes) but he does it anyway, sliding fingers onto Howard's knee and gripping tightly for just a moment before loosening his hold and Howard lifts an eyebrow and stares at the hand and then back up at Bucky and his expression is entirely unreadable.

"I'm trying something," Bucky says and he's pretty sure the whole point of this experiment is to _not tell the guy what he's doing_ but, right. Drunk.

"Is it working?"

"No."

"You're not doing it right. You've got to--" and Howard is pulling his stool up until the wooden legs are touching Bucky's seat and he's adjusting and turning and sitting forward and he moves Bucky's hand just a little bit further up his thigh and keeps his fingers wrapped around Bucky's wrist.

"There are other people in here," Bucky warns but Howard shakes his head softly.

"Nobody's paying attention." He says it less like he's actually being honest and more like he just wants Bucky to shut up and, for once, Bucky is kind of okay with that.

"Right. If this is happening…" Bucky pauses and swallows because… "if"? There is no "if". This is happening. Right now. It is happening. He tilts forward and stares right into Howard's eyes and lowers his voice to barely a whisper. "I'm going to need one more drink."

"I think we can arrange that."

\- -

The alley is dirty and smelly and so terribly wet and the wind gets knocked out of Bucky when he's slammed against the brick wall of the building next to the bar and he barely gets a chance to catch his breath because Howard is pushing their mouths together, grasping a hand into Bucky's short hair, holding his head back and steady, his other hand clutched tight on his hip. Bucky's not sure what to do with his own hands, where they should go or what the fuck they want to do and they settle on clutching fingers into Howard's white shirt and pulling him right up against his chest. They break for a moment and Howard let's go of Bucky's head and settles the hand on the wall and then they just look at each other.

"What?" Bucky finally asks because if nobody's going to say anything maybe they could just get back to why they were there in the first place.

"Indulge my curiosity…"

"Not my first time," Bucky says, already knowing where this is going because he had to answer this with the second guy he's ever been with when he was seventeen. He doesn't bother repeating the question because, in the end, he doesn't give half a fuck and instead he digs his fingernails in just a bit and kisses Howard again to stop him from potentially continuing the conversation.

They're loud - a lot louder than they should be considering they're, well, where they are - and Howard's rougher - rougher than he'd probably be with a woman - but it's okay because Bucky can get pretty rough too and it's kind of amazing how they can pull it off standing up in an alley with the way they're moving but they do and when they're finished they kind of collapse against each other to keep from falling over and breathlessly agree that it definitely won't happen again.

\- -

The next night they drink more and talk less and somehow end up in Howard's surprisingly private room and they're a bit quieter but a lot rougher and Bucky's pretty sure he's going to have bruises in the morning and hopefully none in spots where he might have to attempt to explain himself because the one thing James Barnes has never been very good at is lying, which seems kind of odd to some people but it's - funnily enough - completely true.

They don't do it on the bed because it doesn't feel right so they wind up on the floor, on top of the messy pile of their clothes.

Every frustration with where they are and why they're there and Steve being Steve Now and not Steve Before and god knows what other shit they've got bottled up is just taken out on each other and even when they kiss it hurts and Bucky doesn't know how he feels about it because he's not sure what he's supposed to be doing but it's definitely _not_ this but, yeah, okay, it's good enough for now.


End file.
